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<title>close your eyes; pray for plagues by arklaygothic (clockworkcorvids)</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23061409">close your eyes; pray for plagues</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/clockworkcorvids/pseuds/arklaygothic'>arklaygothic (clockworkcorvids)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Biohazard | Resident Evil (Gameverse), Resident Evil - All Media Types</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Albert Wesker Lives, Canon Compliant, Canon Temporary Character Death, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Study, Game: Resident Evil 1, Gen, Internal Monologue, Mild Gore, No Dialogue, Reincarnation, Self-Reflection, no beta we die like men</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-03-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 07:22:36</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>754</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23061409</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/clockworkcorvids/pseuds/arklaygothic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Mortality is a funny little thing.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Chris Redfield &amp; Albert Wesker</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>14</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>close your eyes; pray for plagues</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>this was the first idea i ever had for a resident evil fic, when i finished re1. the list in the beginning stuck with me in the recesses of my brain for approximately a month before i decided to write it down. wesker is...such an asshole, but such a fascinating character. i hope i captured his personality well enough!</p>
<p>side note - there are some allusions to my own personal headcanons in here. let me know if you spot them ;)</p>
<p>title from <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWggPLXeOkU">pray for plagues</a> by bmth (headphone warning, it's metal and it's <i>loud</i>)</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>There were many things Albert Wesker had never expected to happen to him, and they all went in a neat little list.</span>
</p>
<ol>
<li><span>Dying.</span></li>
<li><span>Dying at the Tyrant’s hands. </span></li>
<li><span>Dying before Chris Redfield.</span></li>
<li><span>Dying, only to come back again.</span></li>
</ol>
<p>
  <span>Then again, he could only claim so much surprise, particularly with respect to the fourth item on the list. The mutated virus had been his own doing—he just hadn’t factored in the chance of having to push it to the limits of its power. The air ripped from his lungs, and the flesh, so quickly he hadn’t known which had come first, had created a moment’s surprise as his feet had left the ground, long and monstrous talons digging into his chest. He had begun to check things off his list as blood drained from the holes left behind when the Tyrant’s claws receded, shirking him off as if he were an irritating little piece of debris to be tossed aside and discarded. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>That hadn’t stopped the smile playing at his thin lips, though, as he dimly, distantly made out the roars and grunts and gunshots of a fight elsewhere in the lab. Maybe far away, maybe in the same room—he couldn’t tell, but he was proud in a twisted way that the Tyrant was still fulfilling its purpose despite...despite what it had done. Wesker couldn’t think of the words to describe this act.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He could not articulate this, nor how he felt in the moment. But he </span>
  <em>
    <span>knew </span>
  </em>
  <span>how he felt nonetheless; he understood it in the slight tugging here and there of muscles in his heart, the nuanced yet subconscious modulation of his breathing, and the blood seeping through his clothes and onto the rough concrete floor, beginning to pool inside his body, trickling around the edges of his internal organs.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Albert Wesker was dying. </span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Shotgun shells clattered on the ground, almost in slow motion, the quick metallic noises bouncing off the ringing in Wesker’s ears. A wet, bubbling sound like a long-dry faucet gurgling back into its usual flow emanated lowly from his throat, and he was far more aware of the subtle vibrations of his trachea than he should have been. There was something at the corner of his lip—he wanted to wipe it away, he </span>
  <em>
    <span>itched</span>
  </em>
  <span> to do so, but he could not. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The Tyrant roared. Wesker was still wearing his Umbrella-issued sunglasses, barely askew on the bridge of his nose. Umbrella could not be shaken from anything, no matter how hard one tried. There were thoughts to be considered, reckonings to be had, if only Wesker had more time. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Albert Wesker was dying at the Tyrant’s hands.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It had been perfect, really. As perfect as a plan with so much improvisation could be, but he’d been on both sides of things. Umbrella the pedestal that held him up; STARS cradled unknowingly in his hands. He’d take out all of Bravo Team, and then Alpha Team. He’d nearly done it, too, had watched most of them turn to monsters or take a bullet somewhere they couldn’t recover from, but of course he’d messed up. Chris, the </span>
  <em>
    <span>bastard</span>
  </em>
  <span>, had stopped being such a damn fool somewhere along the line when Wesker evidently hadn’t been paying enough attention. He must have figured out that Wesker had been manipulating him, must have finally stopped letting his feelings blind him, but Wesker hadn’t been there in the moment when it mattered. He’d missed the cue. He hadn’t gotten the chance to do what he wanted: to stand over Chris with a gun in his hand, smiling down (without his sunglasses, for once) into the eyes of a man far inferior to him in every way, watching fear blossom in Chris’ eyes and blood blossom in the dip between his pectorals.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Albert Wesker was dying before Chris Redfield.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He smelled burning flesh. He smelled </span>
  <em>
    <span>blood</span>
  </em>
  <span>. He wasn’t sure what came from him, and what from the Tyrant. He was aware of the horrifying sensation of his heart speeding up, blood pumping out faster and faster when it should have been slowing, even as his breathing </span>
  <em>
    <span>did</span>
  </em>
  <span> slow. The virus was spreading throughout his cells. He would become godlike, more than human, a revenant in newly formed skin. What goes around comes around, and he would too—he had closed sharp canines around his own tail, and bitten down harder even as the pain began to hit him, and the circle had been completed.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Albert Wesker was dying, only to come back again.</span>
  </em>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>as always, please leave a kudos and/or comment if you enjoyed! i crave feedback and i'm always down to talk fandom stuff :)</p>
<p>thanks for reading!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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